http://swimviking.blogspot.com/2010/04/i-dont-understand-your-sport.html

It would be nice if they could expand the field a bit to include some of the "cinderella" swimmers from the smaller conferences. Would the only drawback be a longer meet? How big of a deal is that? It seems lake an automatic qualifying standard wouldn't be too much to ask.

The swimming powers rarely change much. It seems like only a coaching change shuffles the deck.

I think the first thing to do is limit roster sizes. tu's men's roster has 36 names on it. Stanford has 33. This will force many good swimmers to other teams - which might reduce the dominance of some teams, at least slightly.

I'm not sure I like the idea of advancing conference champions to NCAAs. Like it or not - swimming is a timed sport. And swimmers are absolutely accustomed to time standards.

I wonder how it might work if the A cut were relaxed a bit, and the B cut tightened a bit. Some of the NCAA selection process is based on managing travel costs for each time (that's why a swimmer with a A cut is automatically eligible in all their B cut events). Those pseudo-automatic B cut spots reduce significantly the numuber of B spots given to swimmers that do not have an A cut.

I saw this too. You can read the comments for my full beef, but basically I think it would be a terrible idea.

Basically, top swimmers from the small conferences where they know they can win their race can completely blow off the conference meed, and blow their full load at NCAA's. Like Ashley Danner at George Mason. But swimmers in highly competitive conferences, like the Pac-10, who can't rely on winning their races but will still compete for top 8 spots at NCAA's, will have to put in a big taper to make sure they fit under the Cut-off times.

He's looking at it all like basketball, where teams are chosen subjectively. It's just not equitable. And there's never going to be parity until schools like Missouri State get Big-6 football money, so it would be a futile effort.

If they want a mid-major National Championship meet, then let them have it. It's really an issue of these swimmers, who would've been better off going to D-2 for the most part, being unhappy that the conference meet is their final stopping point, even if they win. I can understand that this might be frustrating. But if you want real parity at NCAA's (watching the same 7 teams compete every year can get old), it needs to come from within the Big 6. They need to find a way where some of the big Texas recruits end up at A&M instead of t.u, and Big 12's isn't a slaughter every year, and where the Big East is a more competitive conference. I agree that Spice's idea of keeping these teams from hoarding all of the swimmers is a good idea.

It reminds me of back in the day, when the top football teams would take tons of potential all-americans, give them scholarships, and sit them on their benches simply to keep the other teams from having them. Only in swimming, instead of scholarships they're lured by the very limited number of programs that get real publicity in swimming and since there's no real opportunities for being a pro swimmer after college, so it doesn't matter to many of them if they make the top 16, they just want to be a part of the best program, and have that chance (with the top facilities and coaches) to get there. They know they can't do that as easily at a vast majority of the mid-majors.

[This message has been edited by AGBlastoff (edited 4/16/2010 5:27p).]